Truth or Dare

by Fern Michaels

  “Yes, here we are. But we’re leaving right now.”

  It wasn’t like the brothers had to pack up tons of luggage or files the way most people who traveled with an entourage such as theirs did. Other people took care of those details. The suites in use would be sanitized, all luggage and file cases would be carried personally out of the hotel by their own people. The hotel would be paid for the full week through a shell company even though they had a week to go on their reservation. All the brothers had to do was put on their jackets, pick up their briefcases, and walk out the door. Everything else would be taken care of by their minions.

  Roland walked over to the window, parted the sheer curtains, and looked down at the highway that ran along the side of the hotel. There was a walkway for guests to use to get to the Lenox Mall, which was across the highway. The people, some single, some looking like families, appeared to him to be like big ants hurrying to find bargains at the giant mall. He wondered briefly what it would be like to be one of those people he considered ordinary.

  Roland Karas lived a secret life in his mind. A life where he lived in a small house in a tree-lined neighborhood, possibly a building that would be considered a cottage. The people would be ordinary, a mix, so to speak. Some would be elderly, some young, some middle aged, some single. There would be children, dogs, and cats. The cottage where he lived would have a fireplace in a brick-lined room because he loved brick walls. Soft carpets because he liked to go barefoot. The cottage would have soft, comfortable furniture; a large-screen TV he would rarely watch; scads of electrical outlets; a gourmet kitchen because he loved to putter in the kitchen trying out new foods and recipes, most of which were inedible, but despite which he continued to try. The rest of the house would have rooms full of books from floor to ceiling. The rooms would have custom-made oak bookshelves because oak was a hardwood and books were weighty. The only exception would be his bedroom, for all he wanted in that room was a space that a monk would love. It was such a waste of time to sleep when he could be reading one of his beloved books.

  The cottage would have a fenced-in backyard with flowers everywhere and a big shade tree with a chair under it, where he could sit and read and feel the spiky grass tickle his bare feet. Ordinary.

  It was never going to happen, and he knew it, but still, as long as he kept the fantasy in his head, it would be possible if only in his dreams. No one could take away a person’s dreams. No one, not even Ryland.

  “What are you doing, brother?” Ryland asked as he slipped into his jacket.

  “Thinking.”

  “About what? I’m ready. What are you seeing out that window?” Ryland asked.

  “Nothing out of the ordinary,” Roland lied. “Have you decided where we are going? Do not say D.C., because if you do, you will go alone. We need to get as far away as we can, and that means out of the country.”

  Ryland offered up a nervous laugh. “What? All because of one female agent who has gone rogue? Are you actually going to stand there, look me in the eye, and tell me you are afraid of Mrs. Allison Bannon, superspook, superagent, super government weapon?”

  “No. I’m not afraid of that person at all. Look at me, Ryland, and listen to me very carefully. I am afraid of Allison Bannon who is the mother of the three children you decided to have kidnapped. And if I’m afraid of her, then you need to be afraid, too.

  “Neither one of us knows a thing about motherhood. Or, I should say, you don’t, but I do because I read. There is no stronger bond, no force in the world that will win out over motherhood if her cubs are in danger. She, yes, she, one lone woman, will come after us. She’ll find us, too. You see, that’s the thing about mothers. They will do anything, and I mean anything, to protect their cubs. No stone will be left unturned. You, more so than I, cannot conceive of that, but it’s true nonetheless.”

  Ryland forced a blustery laugh. “Are you serious, Roland? Surely not. You cannot seriously believe one lone woman on the run from her own government is going to be able to seek us out and take us out. I believe that is the right term. One lone woman! That is never going to happen. Her own people will find her first and deal with her. We might hear about it later on or not. It simply is not going to happen.”

  Roland licked at his lips and nodded. “Not just a woman, Ryland. A mother. Therein lies the difference. Remember, we already made two mistakes, and she’s made none. She’s on the hunt. She’s been so well trained, even her own people won’t be able to locate her. You need to believe what I’m telling you. Well, I think I’m ready,” he said, shrugging into one of his favorite Armani jackets. In his dreams, where he was an ordinary person, he would be slipping into a worn denim jacket with leather patches on the elbows. Cost was probably $49 opposed to the $5,000 spent for the Armani jacket he was putting on. Ordinary.

  Ryland stopped at the door before he opened it to stare at his handsome brother. “You really believe all that stuff you just said, don’t you?”

  Roland nodded. “This is not going to end well, Ryland.”

  In the car on the way to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Ryland looked over at his brother, and said, “Tell me everything you know about motherhood.”

  * * *

  “I never heard of this place before,” Maggie said as she hopped out of the van and looked around. “It’s part of a chain. I looked it up, and there are hundreds of them, independently owned, of course. It’s like an oasis in the middle of a desert. There must be some kind of underground sprinkling system to account for all this lush grass and landscaping. For miles and miles, all you can see is scrubland. And not that far from the District, too. Last Stop before Heaven. I gotta say, for a funeral home, it’s aptly named.”

  “Looks deserted,” Dennis said uneasily. “Who is going to pick the lock? It’s a given this place is buttoned up. It looks . . . dead.”

  “You had to say that, didn’t you,” Ted squeaked. “I guess I am since I have my own lock-picking kit.”

  Espinosa moved then to take as many pictures as fast as he could, so they could leave. He did not like funeral homes. He wondered if anyone really liked funeral homes. Probably only the morticians. The thought of being married to one sent chills up his spine. He continued to click his camera in a frenzy.

  “Make it snappy, Ted. I want to get this over with,” Maggie said as she chewed on her thumbnail, which was already bitten down to the quick.

  “Okay, got it! Who wants to go first?” Ted shoved the lock-picking kit into his backpack and stepped back.

  “You’re all a bunch of wusses. I’ll go. The place is empty. No boogeymen here,” Maggie said.

  “Think about all those spirits that might have come through here. It is the last stop before heaven. Maybe they weren’t ready to head on . . . up there and are still hanging around. I bet there are hundreds of them inside,” Dennis mumbled.

  “One more word out of you, and you’re going to be the last customer to walk through these doors,” Ted shot back.

  Maggie turned to lock the door, then slid the dead bolt at the very top. “Do you all notice this place is . . . like for handicapped? There are no stairs, just ramps. Strange, don’t you think?”

  Her response was a chorus of nos.

  “Well, I think it’s strange, and that’s all that matters. So, should we split up or stay together?”

  “This place gives me the creeps, I say we stay together,” Dennis said, inching closer to Ted, who didn’t object. Espinosa continued to click away as the foursome walked up the ramp into what looked like a receiving room for mourners. The scent of incense and dead flowers permeated the air.

  Maggie led the parade. They switched on lights as they went along. “Chapel. Four pews. Religious statues, empty, of course. Leave the door open. We might need to check this out again. This floor must be what they consider the public area, where the bereaved come. The rooms off to the side with all that heavy velvet must be the . . . You know, where they . . .”

  “Put the dead
bodies on display,” Ted barked. “We get it. The two on the left have coffins in them. The room on the right has six. This is a huge place. We need to split up, or we’ll be here all day.”

  “Maybe this is the room where they . . . you know . . . get them ready for viewing. Or . . . this is the area for . . . prospective . . . what’s the word, customer, guest . . . what?” Maggie babbled.

  Espinosa stopped clicking long enough to scowl at Maggie.

  “Oh jeez, oh jeez,” Dennis yelped. “Okay, okay, I’ll go down to the next level. It looks like office space,” he said as he pressed a light switch. Two things happened simultaneously. The room was flooded with blinding white light, and somber, spine-chilling music bounced off the walls. Startled, he adjusted the switch. The lighting turned dim, and the music became a mournful dirge. He soldiered on, calling out his findings as he checked out the suite of rooms. “Eli and Ethel Oberman are the owners of this . . . this place. The license is hanging on the wall. Looks fake to me if anyone wants my opinion. There is no raised seal. A license has to have a raised seal. Why didn’t they take it with them? It’s bogus, I’m sure of it. File drawers are full of folders, the records of all the deceased. Hundreds of them.”

  Maggie tuned out her colleague as she made her way to the rear of the first floor. The plaque on the door said, STORAGE. She opened the door to see row after row of coffins. She turned on the light and gasped. Boxes was her first thought. The kids were right. This is where they were kept and probably slept. She suddenly felt sick to her stomach. “Espinosa, get in here! Now!”

  Espinosa skidded to a stop in the doorway, his gaze raking the rows of coffins of every shape, size, and color. “Oh crap!”

  “Take some close-ups. The . . . the . . . bedding is mussed.” Maggie swallowed hard. The vision of little kids sleeping in what was in front of her was almost more than she could bear. Tears pooled in her eyes. She felt a gentle hand on her shoulder. Ted. Ted was always there for her. She bit down on her lower lip. She needed to toughen up. She really did need to do that.

  “If it’s any consolation, Maggie, little kids wouldn’t have any conception of what this place was to them. They said they slept in boxes. These are just boxes. That’s how you have to think of it.”

  Maggie hiccuped. “This place is in the middle of nowhere. Where’s the damn cemetery? I didn’t see one driving in.”

  “Just because this is a mortuary doesn’t mean there’s a cemetery that goes with it. That’s an ordinance thing towns work with. I’m not an authority, I’m just guessing here,” Ted said soothingly as he kept a tight grip on Maggie’s shoulder.

  Maggie almost jumped out of her skin when she heard Dennis let loose with a bloodcurdling yelp. “You need to come see this. There must be close to a thousand of those jars! Those are ashes! People! What’s left of them. Look, they have names on them. They fry . . . burn . . . roast, crisp them in that big brick thing in the back, then . . . then they bring them in here and line them up. Look! That big one has a lightning bolt on it. Who does that?” he dithered.

  “Either my hearing is accelerating, or someone is ringing the doorbell. Do you hear it?” Espinosa asked as he lowered his camera to tilt his head to the side. “It is the doorbell.”

  “Oh, shit!” Ted muttered. “What should we do?”

  “Well, we lit this place up like a Christmas morning, so whoever it is knows someone is in here. If we stay here, maybe they’ll go away. I locked the door and slid the dead bolt at the top, so even if someone has a key, they can’t get in. Let’s finish with this room, check out the basement where they . . . where they . . .”

  “Where they what?” Dennis demanded.

  “Drain the deceased’s blood and embalm them,” Espinosa shot back.

  “I don’t think we need to go down there,” Maggie finally decided as the doorbell continued to ring.

  “If we go to the front, stay close; I think we can make it to that hallway where all those coffins are. The room on the right with the six coffins will give us a view of the front door and those two side panels. We’ll be able to see who it is being so damn insistent,” Ted said.

  “This feels like a conga line,” Dennis said as he grabbed hold of Ted’s belt and allowed himself to be dragged forward.

  “Okay, we’re here, now what do we do? The bell is still ringing. They must be desperate, whoever they are,” Maggie said as she stared down at the bronze coffin in front of her. She frowned when she saw the small brass plate near the gold-plated handles. Agnes Twitt.

  “You guys ever hear of a casket line called Agnes Twitt?” Maggie asked. “Springfield I’ve heard of. Pricey. Top of the line. I just saw a commercial for them on TV a few weeks ago. Creeped me out.”

  Ted turned around so fast he almost knocked Maggie off her feet, the force making her fall back against the coffin, causing it to hit the wall and the lid fly open, then careen around and roll down the ramp toward the front door, where it came to a full stop with Agnes Twitt bouncing up and back in her nest of pillows.

  “Holy shit!” Ted, Dennis, and Espinosa said in unison. Maggie, her eyes glazed, tottered down the ramp to stare at Agnes Twitt, then at the men on the other side of the door. “What . . . what just happened?” she managed to squeak as she stared at Agnes Twitt and the string of pearls that were caught in one of her ears.

  “We’re closed! Can’t you read the sign?” Ted bellowed, so the men on the other side of the door could hear him.

  “Our grandfather just died. We need to bring him here. We wish him to be cremated. This is his wish. Our family’s wish. He wanted this place,” the man closest to the window shouted.

  “Sorry, mister, the owners left town. There is no one here to help you.”

  “Then what is that person doing in the casket behind you?” the voice on the other side bellowed just as loud as Ted had bellowed. “Why are you here if the place is closed?”

  “That’s . . . that’s Agnes. She’s waiting for pickup. Why else do you think she’s here by the door? You need to leave now. We’re just here to help out temporarily. We have our orders. Besides this place is expensive. See this casket, it’s bronze, and it costs $25,000. Top-of-the-line Springfield. You can get it cheaper somewhere else,” Ted said in a jittery voice.

  “Tell him the bedding is silk and cashmere,” Maggie hissed. Ted looked at her like she’d sprouted a second head.

  “Just the cover and pillows cost a fortune because they’re silk and cashmere. It was what . . . what Agnes wanted,” Ted managed to gasp, his eyes wide as saucers as he stared first at Agnes Twitt, then the men at the door. He wondered who would fix the pearls around her neck.

  “Money is no object,” came the retort. “We want to send our grandfather off with the best.”

  “Well, buddy, that ain’t gonna happen because. . . because it ain’t gonna happen. Now, skedaddle, or I’m calling the police,” Ted said with as much authority as he could muster in his voice, considering the circumstances. “We’re closed. We are out of business. Read the sign. You . . . you have our condolences on the death of your grandfather.”

  Maggie, Espinosa, and Dennis bobbed their heads up and down to show that the men outside had their condolences as well.

  Cursing, the men turned to leave. The four intrepid reporters pressed themselves up against the two side windows to watch as the gaggle of men trailed back to two mud-caked pickup trucks. They watched until they lost sight of the trucks.

  As one, they turned around to stare at Agnes Twitt and her pearls, which were askew.

  “We’re really sorry about this, Agnes. Wherever you are, think about this. If Ted hadn’t jostled me, you’d be in that room maybe forever. Everything happens for a reason—we all know that. Oh, God! Do you think there are other bodies in those other coffins?” Maggie babbled as she stared down at Agnes Twitt.

  “Did you take a picture of Agnes?”

  “Yes. I. Did!” Espinosa responded.

  “Good, because no one is going to be
lieve this. Come on, we need to check the rest of those . . . those boxes, then make some calls,” Maggie said.

  “What about Agnes?” Dennis asked.

  “Seriously, Dennis? We can’t take her back up. She has to stay here. Move!”

  Back in the room, it was left to Ted to raise the tops of the coffins. “This is Alfred Saddlebury. Looks like he’s been here a while. He’s not looking so good. And this one is Chester Mason. He looks kind of fresh, like he was just done recently. And this one is Sasha Yakodowsky. Too much rouge for a lady her age. The last one is . . . Oh, crap . . . this is Benjamin Franks. He looks to be about ten. And he’s been here wayyyy too long. Don’t look, Maggie.”

  Dennis was busy dialing 911. He explained the situation and said, “We’ll be waiting outside. Please be careful, Agnes is right up against the door. There’s no way we can get that gurney back up the ramp. And when you do get her you might want to . . . to . . . adjust her pearls. It’s a lady thing. Women and their pearls.”

  “We need a cover story for all of this,” Ted said, waving his arms about.

  “We were here to meet with the Obermans to do a story on how they came up with the name for the mortuary. Human interest. That kind of thing. The door was open so we walked in and felt something was wrong. Soon as we discovered what we . . . discovered . . . we called nine-one-one. We do not mention the men at the door. Is that clear?” Maggie said in her take-charge voice that no one in their right mind would ever argue with.

  “I guess that will work,” Espinosa said as he packed his camera in his backpack.

  “What do you think would have happened to those . . . the deceased if we hadn’t come here?” asked Dennis. “What do you think those men would have done with . . .”

  “Don’t go there, kid,” said Ted. “It didn’t happen. That’s the good thing. This is in other hands now.”